


tender graces

by ElasticElla



Series: If Not, Winter [8]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angels, Brief suicide ideation, Canonical Character Death, F/F, Season/Series 01, minor bella/jack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-28 12:16:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16241432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElasticElla/pseuds/ElasticElla
Summary: Bella can feel herself inching towards death when she first hypothesizes it. She’s started having more bad days than good ones, must write down all her theories to remember them when she wants to think upon them.





	tender graces

**Author's Note:**

> come visit me on [tumblr \o/](http://lesbiancleophas.tumblr.com/)

Bella can feel herself inching towards death when she first hypothesizes it. She’s started having more bad days than good ones, must write down all of her theories to remember them when she wants to think upon them. (To leave proof for Jack in case-)

She doesn’t tell Jack how bad it’s getting. A cocktail of pride and guilt, can’t stand to have her final moments smothered and full of tears. Bella sees Jack in the evenings, and when she presses, he tells her all she wishes to know about the Ripper. One last quest before the end comes or she forces it. Quests always have such romantic endings. 

Bella is dying, there is nothing left worth fearing. 

Not the wolf hiding in daylight, a doctor of the mind and body indeed. There is no proof, and knowing Hannibal surely he would destroy everything the moment a warrant was attempted. That so many suspect him and naught has been done says quite enough about the matter. 

But Bella has another idea, from half-forgotten childhood stories her grandmother would tell her. Of angels coming down to the world with all of heaven’s might, one wing dipped in blood and one in light. Of single-minded beings, with a disposition towards destruction. Like a dragon, her grandmother would say, only dragons can be sated with gold. An angel’s work is never complete, for there is always sin upon this earth. 

Bella kneels on the hardwood floor, an ache in her knees already blooming. There is not much she can offer an angel- has no followers, no freshly created wonders, no idols to destroy. She has her pain, palms outstretched as if she could summon the cancer to her fingertips. 

“I beg you. There is a man who dares act a false god, who kills without discrimination and consumes their flesh. I beg of you for help, offer all I am.” 

Bella waits, breathing slow and pushing away the thoughts that it didn’t work, that they aren’t real. She repeats her grandmother’s words over and over, until her bones hum with them: _to be heard is easy child, it is in being judged worthy the difficulty lays_. She waits and waits, a low almost crackling in her ears, a far off static that she cannot identify. She waits and waits, hands resting open atop her knees, her grandmother’s words still going. They no longer sound the same, they no longer think the same; each word twisting, curious if a word does mean the same after all or perhaps it too is fluid seeks to-

It is with both surprise and not, that when she looks up there is unmistakably an angel in her hallway. From afar she might be mistaken as human, but her very being seems to pulse with energy, her beauty so perfect it hurts to contemplate. Though she does not seem to be a large nor tall woman, her presence shrinks the hallway dramatically, as though Bella has tripped into Wonderland. 

“You came,” Bella breathes, fingers aching but daring not to touch. 

“Your monster is known.” 

And Bella _has_ to blink, has never hated her eyelids so much, a flash of fire behind them, and then the angel is gone. 

She stands, feeling wobbly and small, slowly makes her way to the kitchen. Tea, a hot cup of tea, will restore her senses. (It does not.)

Jack is called away nearly the moment he steps inside, kissing her briefly before going to Lecter’s. She flips on the television, and news travels fast today, a picture of Hannibal looking far more professor than killer on the screen, subtitle declaring him murdered. She wonders how much longer before they switch the photo, until they count up all the bodies in his fridge. 

Pain comes back, it never truly leaves, but it’s more sharp now, has her stumbling to her notebook. Bella writes Jack a last note, no confession only love. 

.

Chiyoh works efficiently, hunting all nearby monsters within the night. Bella’s offer may have been for one, but it is rare to receive a true offer in these times, of one who wants to see the land razed over. (Bella herself may not even know, but Chiyoh learned how to read faces before words.)

She kills them all the same. There will be no mystery of what connects all of them, only of who and how. Perhaps it will dissuade others, but Chiyoh will not be clipping her wings any century soon. 

Chiyoh extinguishes lives until dawn’s rays reach her, returning to the devotee. 

.

Bella thinks she might still be dreaming, the whole world feels hazy. The angel has returned, immaculate, not a speck of blood on her. 

“It is done.” 

And Bella knows it to be true as she knows all simple truths. That Jack got caught up with Hannibal’s case and what his house revealed that he never came home last night; that her last dinner was reheated lasagna, far too warm, burning her taste buds. That she’s imagined this moment so many times, before the diagnosis and even more after, but never like this.

That there might be a sense of accomplishment bright enough to overshadow regrets and impossibilities. That it feels more like closing a book than burning it. 

Chiyoh smiles, and she knows that too though the angel still hasn’t introduced herself. 

“Good,” Bella says.

She reaches for her, kissing Chiyoh, as a moth ensnared by the sun. Lightning strikes into her at every point of contact, and Bella knows no more.


End file.
